Does word verification on blogs bother you?
Have you guys been put off a blog by the word verification process? so often I find wonderful blogs with great posts that I want to comment on and when I press the 'post comment' button all kinds of windows open asking me to copy the words. Sometimes I end up doing it several times before the captcha is satisfied and allows me to post the comment. I am thoroughly tired by that time. Come on, I am only human (pun intended)
I can understand that this is a way to catch spam comments, but there must be other ways to do it. After all there are so many blogs that get hundreds of comments but don't use captcha.
I would love to hear what you folks think of this.
Also, I would like to know if posting comments on my blog is tedious and if yes, in what way, so that I can get it straightened out.
(PS: I am not sure about the category this topic should go into, so am posting it in Blogging Beginners)
Reason: To make the topic more explicit
word verification is irritating and one can and should appreciate when someone succedes in posting a nice comment. after the barrier. I would be more liberal and let the comments come up and delete spams later. it would take my time but, i feel it that way.
commenting on your blog is easy and great. simple. I liked it. nothing more can be done i think.
Thank you for the feedback. I am glad that my blog is easy is comment on. Actually there are times when I leave the blog without commenting to avoid going through all the trouble.
Captcha codes catch comment bots who come and post comments on your site. Your server is saved the load of handling/storing the comments since the bots cannot enter captchas properly.
It is a nuisance, but so is waiting in line, stopping at traffic lights, and (ugh!) dancing in baaraat's of grooms who are related to your wife's uncle's mother's cousin's sister's grandaugther's brother-in-law.
Still if you keep capctha, it assures you of a long peaceful life, just like the three things I mentioned.
Or you can use Akismet. Look for it in the section "Plugins>Add New" on the Admin panel of your wordpress blog. But then you would be storing the spam for a certain period and increasing your DB size. And it would give you cram you with details on the spam, ham, and any other 'am' if you ever look at its stats.
Keeping captcha might give you a long peaceful life (loved the three examples you have given) but what about the commenters?
My blog has akismet and I routinely empty the spam. It takes a little bit of my time, but the commenters are spared theirs. However, the settings are such that first time comments need to be approved.
Now I don't know how it is done since my son manages the setttings for me. All I do is write, post and reply comments 
well, then relax.
Maybe I will remove the captcha and see for myself if I am attacked again by spammers. In my first week of blogging I saw on my phone that I had received over 300 comments in the last couple of days. I was very excited, and when I logged in, I realized that it was 100% spam. yuck! That's when I installed Akismet.
Recently added Capctha, cos Akismet misses stuff sometimes.
also, you have to have visitors to have commentors. right now, I have only 5-6 visits a day. Most are from IB. and its only on the days that I am active here. Maybe I should reconsider having a blog. LOL
Ha ha. That must have been some let down to find all spam comments. You have a good blog and I read some of the posts which are replete with acid wit. And I do think you are being modest about the views, aren't you?
you are right about Akismet goofing up sometimes, but when it happened and my regular commenters were sent to spam and spammers got approved, I yelled 'Help!' and nagged some true to my name and viola! the problem got fixed in double quick time. Aren't I lucky?
nope, 100% true. my blog has the least visitors.
The strange part is, I often come across really terrible blogs with dozens of comments (and possibly hundreds of visitors). And for the next couple of days, I wonder about the pointlessness of blogging for yourself (which is what I seem to be doing). I may as well type stuff out in a text file and store it on my hard-drive for occasional reading (by me).
*sigh* the perils of being needy for approval...
Ummm, how about giving it a non-newsy look? When I first opened the blog, I thought it was one of those news-based blogs, till I began reading. I am dogged reader and I like going through interesting blogs and posting comments too. Incidentally, I skipped commenting when I saw captcha on your blog 
darn it, I just changed my theme cos people said it was too simple! I dunno what to do.
But the captcha thing just HURT!!!!!!
Captcha disabled now. Bloggers can be choosers. Or something like that.
*can't
In that case, go with what your head and heart tell you otherwise it will be like the story of the father-son-donkey 
Ok, ok, this one time, I will grit my teeth and post a comment.
Save your teeth the trouble. I already disabled the captcha plugin. :o)
That's so sweet of you Arti. Thanks for it.
Arti! What about disqus?
I am eternally grateful to you for turning it off, since yours is one of the blogs I always leave a comment! I don't spend too much time on computer and when that limited time is gone in word verification which involves so many steps, I feel frustrated. The only choice then is to leave without commenting. There is an option in wordpress that allows you to empty the spam folder in one stroke. I do it every morning as I would empty a garbage can! Moderation is still ok as sometime spam gets in. I have a filter that holds a comment for moderation when a person comments for the first time. Thereafter, it is published instantly.
I should thank my son Vinni for making the comment section of my blog easy.
@Pramod: Vineet was the one who started me off to blogging and he still manages the technical details. All I have to do is nag him
Word verification, really irritates a lot. And when we have to comment on many blogs in less time, reading it from heart completely, it takes a lot of time.
I have Disqus and it uses akismet too. still have moderation too to avoid some meaningless comments.
Zypher your blog is perfect and easy to comment too.
Thank you Mohini. I like blogs with Disqus since it is a one step process to get your comment published as the name and email are stored in it. I agree with you about waste of time when trying to comment on multiple blogs. I have been spared such comments at least so far. Touch wood!
When I was new to blogging, I had word verification, but my friend didn't like it, so I removed it.
Yes it does , but if post is extremely good than nothing can stop me from commenting .
Agree Dhiraj! I do too, but due to time constraints, I pass some blogs without leaving a comment.
@Pramod: That's the point. sometimes the word verification is so complicated that one can't get it right the first time, especially with my vision problem. When the word verification and the comment are in the same window, I don't mind. It is a one click thing. Otherwise you post the comment and then the verification window opens and then you have to click the post comment again till you are tired and weary of clicking....
So true, we get tired......really.
Some system use some easy images or like what is 6+2= I like that system. it's easy to use.
yes, i've seen that type too, and one i saw somewhere was, you have to just click a small box that I am not a spammer, just small tick mark by mouse, and comment,
nice and easy,
@Pramod: I think i shuuld go on a discoverry trip to find out such fun stuff on blogs instead of complaining about word verification woes
word verification is a worthless thing, with technology advancing one can find better ways. if word verification is that necessary, why make it garbled up to stress whole mind to decipher.
single word could do the job intended.
I got the addition fun when contacted Indiblogger. and never seen on blogs. But I think it shouldn't be much difficult. Myself haven't tried yet...
I agree about open id errors but if you dare it to refuse your comment, it will post it I don't feel comfortable with the google account since I have personal accounts and if it is open, the comment gets posted with that id. I like to keep my personal and blogging world separate.
Liked your idea to make a blogger come back to yours
I use 2 browsers - Safari & Firefox .. one for all blog related requirements/browsing/comments/etc and the other for work or personal use.
That way I don't get my two gmails (personal and blog) mixed up. I stay logged into two gmail accounts at the same time through this method.
Works for me.
Already my life is too complicated and if I begin using two browsers I will get hopelessly tangled in more confusion. But idea bura nahin hain
Yep, It's not for everyone. that's why i said 'works for me' :o)
zephyr, thanks for comment on marriagebook, I hope it was not tedious task. if any trouble ,then please tell me , I 'll try to chk it out.
moderation doesn't happen the second time.
I would be grateful, if you could spare some time to post any hilarious or any educative instance as a post. at marriagebook.
@Pramod: You are welcome Pramod. No, I didn't have any problem at all. Knowing that moderation is only a first time thing, is good to know. It is the same in my blog too. At first the spam filter was really good but then mistakes began occuring and so Vinni put in the moderation plug in for first timers and to catch out spammers.
Thank you for the offer. I will definitely try and post something there. Can it be something already published on my blog?
I posted some fiction there, but Zephyr, you probably have a thousand stories that you haven't yet shared on your blog.
Ideally, the content on two blogs should not be the same. Search Engines do not like that. They may assume that it is plagiarism and that may negatively impact either of the blogs in search engine rankings.
err, I think.
@Rumbaho: Was it a hypothetical gyan or is it really so? i shared a post with Barkha Dhar a while ago since she liked it a lot. Now will I be blacklisted by the searchengines? Panic, panic !!
The problem is I have a lot of stories but no time. I haven't written anyrthing since I started this thread because unlike the net savvy gen Y I can't multitask at this.
@ Zephyr,
I'm quite serious about it.
It is not recommended to have the same post in two places. Search Engines, say Google, believe that by doing this you are not adding to the quality of the content on the internet. So most likely that the postcreated first would get SOME credit but the copied post would get negative points and would effect the pagerank, etc. Also, since the there would be backlinks between the two blogs through this post, the newer copy's negative ranking would adversely effect the original post.
That is my layman's understanding about this. I hope I was able to explain it properly.
If I remember correctly, there's this guy who rides around on an Enfield and works on India's best blogging forum. You might know him, I think. ;o)
Maybe you can confirm with him if things are as serious as I believe. :o)
@Rumbaho: I think i know the guy you mentioned vaguely but that fellow is so busy that I have to take an appointment to even call him, leave alone ask about these things!
Word verification or captcha is really irritating i even request bloggers whom i follow to remove it, otherwise i just dont bother to leave my comment
I have started doing that. The first person who responded to it was Arti. I can understand the first time a commenter is asked to do it and the comment held for moderation but subsequent ones should be allowed. I usually like reading new blogs and leaving a comment if I like the post. This really puts me off.
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